Existing healthcare treatment planning systems require continual manual observation, intervention, and documentation of treatment outcomes and comparison of outcomes with expected or desired treatment objectives. Variances indicating a variation of patient treatment from planned treatment are identified and recorded in a patient treatment plan. The management of expected outcomes and variances within a Treatment Plan requires constant vigilance and documentation by healthcare provider personnel (nurses, physicians, managers etc.) involved in the treatment plan. Existing systems require significant manual intervention by a healthcare worker to manage care plans. The time and burden involved in managing a treatment plan deters use of standardized care plans because healthcare providers give greater priority to hands on patient care than to care documentation. Therefore, much documentation is done retrospectively and is often incomplete or incorrect. Further, in a health care environment there is often pressure to reduce staff to patient ratios and this is hampered by a need to provide such comprehensive documentation in a timely manner due to the manual intervention and associated resources involved. An automated system according to invention principles provides treatment plan management and addresses these problems and associated problems.